Black Magick
by Starzipan
Summary: This is a little fic that I have been working on for a while that I was inspired to finish and post by X2. If anyone likes it, I will continue. It's Wolvie/OOC, and it's rated for some naughty language (tsk, tsk Logan). P.S. I know the title is corny..
1. Default Chapter

Author's Note: I posted an earlier version of this story a loooooong time ago…but I wasn't really satisfied w/ it, so I never continued it. This story has bits n' pieces of the old one (which was called _Going Back To Westchester)_, but it is also going to be different. Eventually it's going to be romance between Logan and my OC, Liara Suzuki, so if you aren't down w/ that….don't read it!!!! Otherwise, please enjoy and review, review, review!

Disclaimer: I don't own the X-men, the X-mansion, Professor X, the city of Salem Center, the state of New York…or really anything at all besides this crappy computer and the 3 bucks in my pocket…oh yeah, and Liara, I own her too.

And, now, without further adieu…

Black Magick

By Starzipan

Chapter One: There's No Place Like Home

It was still a little dark outside when the taxi pulled up to the mansion, barely stopping to let its single passenger slip out into the chilly morning air. After collecting his money, the driver sped off, eager to be out of the shadow of the looming brick building; like most of the people in Salem Center he turned a deaf ear to the rumors about Xavier's Institute, but that didn't mean he wanted any part in anything that went on there. Left alone, the young woman who had emerged from the cab stared up at the building expressionlessly through a pair of sunglasses that seemed ridiculous in the predawn light. After a long while, she absently brought a hand up to trace the raised lettering on a wall plaque, and a slight shadow of emotion crossed her somber face. 

Taking a deep breath, as if she was bracing herself to go on, she went to the keypad on the gate and entered her long unused code. The mechanism opened to allow her in, and closed swiftly behind her, almost as if it was swallowing her up. Ignoring the slight claustrophobia of the grounds, she strode up the steps purposefully, until she stood facing the door, eye to eye with the tastefully hideous brass knocker. Her fingers were a step ahead of her, already retyping the code into the electronic pad by the intercom. As foreign as the mansion seemed to her now, it didn't occur to her to knock. She had been promised that she would always have a place here, and despite all the events that had alienated her from it, the mansion was still the closest thing she had to a home.

A mechanical voice chirped from the speaker, "Vocal clarification?"

Absentmindedly putting on the sunglasses, she leaned forward and spoke a name that she had abandoned so long ago it seemed like a dirty secret parting from her tongue. "Liara Suzuki." 

"Welcome to the X-mansion, Liara," the computer recited cheerfully. At the same instant, the door sprang open with a click.

A feeling sprang up inside her as her hand grazed the doorknob. It had been so long since she had felt anything at all that it took her a second to recognize the emotion that made her palms begin to sweat and sent a tiny tremor down the back of her neck. She finally placed it: fear, mingled with anticipation. She treasured the flash of emotion, even as it faded into the void of nothingness that occupied too much of her mind. Meanwhile, the door had swung aside, revealing the dark interior of the mansion.

Liara stepped inside, her black boots falling soundlessly on the carpet. She exhaled harshly, letting out a breath she hadn't realized she'd drawn. The polished antique bench by the door was exactly as it had been, and the sundry collection coats and umbrellas on the rack was hauntingly unchanged. It was all nearly the same as it had been when she'd left, as if she had stepped back seven years and slid into her old life. Perhaps, she thought, they would not even notice she had been gone. 

The click of the door echoed loudly in the empty hall, startling Liara from her reverie. Pushing aside the waves of memory that had flooded into her head, she used her powers to do a cursory mental scan of the mansion. Not surprisingly, she was one of the only ones awake at this time of day; not even Xavier was up at four thirty in the morning. 

Suddenly realizing how long it had been since she'd last eaten, Liara decided to head for the kitchen. She knew that between Bobby and Hank's love of junk food, and Ororo's wholesome vegetarian tastes she was assured of finding something she liked to eat. She also wondered idly if she would be able to find some decent beer in the staff refrigerator; she was in need of something refreshing, and Scott's Coors Light just wasn't going to cut it. 

She found the kitchen in the same place that it had always been in, and she had to bite her lip to keep from laughing out loud at the fact that this surprised her. Feeling far more relaxed, she pushed open the kitchen door and barely had time to gasp before she found herself restrained by an extremely strong arm clutching her neck in chokehold, and something coldly metallic pricking into her temple.

A man's deep voice rumbled at her from the darkness behind her. "Well, now what have we here?" 

She wriggled a little, and wondered if she could somehow grab his wrist and snatch the knife she assumed was pressed to her forehead from his hand. In response, the grip tightened.

"Now darlin'," the voice, now tinged with amusement, warned, "I wouldn't do that if I were you."

"Bastard," Liara muttered, believing him. His arm felt strong enough to snap her in two, and she really wasn't up for a fight with super mutant, especially considering her empty stomach. She considered biting the beast's arm in protest, but decided to let the scene play out on its own. After all, she hadn't exactly called to announce her arrival, and most of Xavier's boarders had reason to be suspicious of unknown people creeping around the mansion at night.

"Probably," the man agreed lightly, then his tone hardened, "Now let's get down ta business. Who the fuck are you?"

"Magick," She said, offering him the code name she went by these days. She scanned his mind briefly. His barriers were too strong to allow her to hear his thoughts, but she picked up his surface emotions: a startlingly savage mix of aggression, animosity, and – she snorted – male appreciation. _Well, at least one of us is enjoying himself,_ she thought wryly.

"Magick? What are ya, a stripper?" His body rippled with laughter against her back.

"Sorry to disappoint, but it's been a while since I've taken off my clothes for cash," she shot back, bristling at the insult to her name, "For now, I'm just a normal girl trying to get some breakfast."

His grip on her neck loosened a little, and his voice turned perplexed. "Are you one o' tha Cajun's broad's?"

  
Before she could explain, either with words or with fists, to this unfortunate new edition to the X-Mansion that she was no one's 'broad', the creaking of the kitchen door announced the arrival of someone new. 

"Logan?" a sleepy feminine voice questioned in exasperation, accompanied by the flicking on of bright overhead lights, "What are you doing?"  
  
"Jeannie!" The beast, who was apparently the 'Logan' in question, swiveled slightly and loosened his hold on Liara's neck. She heard a ~snikt~ sound, and the cold metal of the 'knife' was withdrawn; the arm, however, remained tightly fastened around her throat.  
As her eyes adjusted to the sudden light, Liara made out Jean Grey's familiar silhouette. For a moment, she looked exactly as she had at seventeen, pale, slender, and serious beyond her years. All at once Liara discovered an irritating capacity for nostalgia that she had never known she had possessed. She recalled with a pang the distant past in which the woman standing before her had been her best friend.  
As her vision sharpened, Liara saw the redhead clearly, and saw the ways in which she had changed. Her girlishly long hair was layered around her chin, and her face was more stunningly angular. This older Jean Grey had a strong confidence that she held around herself like a cloak, even in her bathrobe in the middle of the night; Liara knew that if she had seen this new Jean on the street she wouldn't have known her.   
  
Drowsily unaware of who Logan was holding captive, Jean asked, "Who is that?"  
  
Liara felt Logan shrug behind her. "One o' th' Cajun's females I found sneaking around lookin' fer a midnight snack," he said, assuming. Liara raised an eyebrow at the tone, and wondered what kind of a snack he meant exactly.  
  
"I am not–" Liara began, only to be cut off by Jean.  
  
"Remy is back with Rogue," Jean said, informatively.  
  
Logan tensed. "Then who the hell is this?"  
  
"I'm–"  
  
Jean, who had woken up enough to scan Liara's mind, interrupted again, this time with disbelief in her voice. "Liara? Magick, is that you?" she asked, wonderingly.  
  
"Flamin' hell," Logan growled, confusion quickening to irritation, "Would one of you ladies be so kind as to explain?"  
  
Sensing that if she didn't hurry, she wouldn't be in one piece long enough to start talking, Liara spoke. "I'm Black Magic. Liara Suzuki…if you want. I used to go to school here, until…" she hesitated, not caring to delve into the past, "until circumstances changed. I guess you could say I've come home for a visit."  
  
"She's telling the truth, Logan, you can release her," Jean said quietly, eyeing the hairy arm around Liara's neck. Thus freed, Liara hurriedly moved away from her captor. She was startled to be grabbed immediately by Jean, in what turned out to be an embrace, not an attack. It was the first time in seven years that anyone had touched Liara without intending to hurt her.  
  
"You're back," Jean murmured, reluctantly ending the embrace. Inadvertently, Liara heard the rapid succession of Jean's thoughts. She was startled at the intensity of her old friend's joy; the X-men had missed her, after all. 

"Liara!" Jean exclaimed again, squeezing her hand and interrupting Liara's thoughts.  
  
"Magick," Liara corrected, seeking refuge in the comfort of her moniker. It had been years since she had trusted anyone enough to let them call her by her real name, and now it grated.  
  
Magic," Jean corrected absentmindedly, then turned to Liara in wonderment, one hand on each of her shoulder's, as if she had to touch her to believe that she was real. "You're back…we all thought…Magick! I have to go tell Charles!" and with that, Jean ran out of the room, turning back only to cast an incredulous smile at Liara, before she   
hurried to wake the rest of the mansion.  
  
Fighting down the urge to run after Jean, Liara searched for something to distract her from her emotion. As if on cue, her stomach growled loudly. Turning away from the door, Liara eyed   
the refrigerator with glee.   
  
A snort from the other side of the room reminded her she was not alone. "Hungry?" asked her former captor sarcastically.  
  
She spared him a glare, taking in his physical appearance and trying her best not to do a double take at the insolent man lounging shirtless, beer in hand, against the counter. He was built…perfectly put together, but like a fighter, not an athlete. With a smirk, she entertained thoughts of what he must use all those muscles for. Then she narrowed her eyes at the beer in his left hand.  
  
"Done lookin', darlin'?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at her.  
  
She didn't even bother to reply to his flippant remark. As nice as his body was, it was a shame he had absolutely no idea of how to treat a lady. "Is that a Molson's?" She asked, trying not to salivate.  
  
He seemed disgruntled that she didn't bat her lashes at him and play the flirt. *Screw you too*, Liara replied mentally, unwilling to exert the effort necessary to form a retort.  
  
"Yeah," he grunted. Then a second later it seemed to occur to him that she wasn't asking just to make small talk. "They're in the fridge."   
  
Liara took that as an offer, and grabbed herself one, as well as a Styrofoam container of leftover Pad Thai, from the refrigerator. Cold beer in one hand, a forkful of Westchester's most delicious Asian cuisine in the other, and a vicious man who seemed to be able to sprout metal claws at will watching over her like a hawk, Liara experienced a degree of contentment that had been foreign to her in recent years; it was true what they said, there really was no place like home. 

Love it? Hate it? Have anything at all to say about it? Please R&R….If I get my magic number of reviews, I'll keep going! And flamers, bring your own marshmallows!


	2. The Plot Thickens

Author's Note: I posted an earlier version of this story a loooooong time ago.but I wasn't really satisfied w/ it, so I never continued it. This story has bits n' pieces of the old one (which was called Going Back To Westchester), but it is also going to be different. Eventually it's going to be romance between Logan and my OC, Liara Suzuki, so if you aren't down w/ that..don't read it!!!! Otherwise, please enjoy and review, review, review! Disclaimer: I don't own the X-men, the X-mansion, Professor X, the city of Salem Center, the state of New York.or really anything at all besides this crappy computer and the 3 bucks in my pocket.oh yeah, and Liara, I own her too. And, now, without further adieu.   
  
Black Magick  
  
By Starzipan  
  
Chapter Two: The Plot Thickens (and here you thought there wouldn't be one)  
  
The X-mansion was, without a doubt, a building of function. Its numerous rooms were classrooms and libraries, dorm rooms where students were sheltered from the world so that they might study it, and, on certain lower levels, research laboratories and hospital rooms; there was even a hangar where a certain plane, the existence of which defied modern science, was kept. The people who moved within the mansion walls had a purpose; they were on their way to school, or to work, or to save the world. It was understandable that few of them noticed the singular beauty of the building that housed them.  
  
Liara, long deprived of beauty, noticed. She stood alone in the middle of a long hallway, one that she had often walked down as a student, late to class more often than not. Behind her, on one side of the hall, ran a series of polished oak doors belonging to several classrooms. The side of the hall she faced was set with enormous glass windows, their elaborately leaded panes reminiscent of cathedral architecture.  
  
Standing with your back against the wall with the doors, the ground was not visible through the windows, and you felt a certain sensation of vertigo, as if you were falling into the broad blue sky above the mansion. When Jean and Liara had discovered this as children, they had nicknamed the mansion the 'Castle on a Cloud', in reference to the song in Les Miserables. Looking back, Liara was startled at the accuracy of the childhood metaphor; for most of the children coming to Charles Xavier's school, the mansion was a real life version of Cosette's fantasy.  
  
A bell rang, startling Liara. She smiled a little to herself as all the doors along the hallway instantly sprang open, and children poured into the hallway. For a second, as she watched them through her ever present dark glasses, she was able to recall the joy of being released from class; then, watching the students talking and joking together, the feeling slipped away, and was replaced with a terrible emptiness. The innocence that these children took for granted had been stripped from her. She knew that, even in memory, she could never have it back.  
  
As the hall slowly emptied, Liara walked down the hall and stood in front of one of the doors. She stared at the plaque on the door, which read 'Charles Xavier'. He must know she was there, although he did not reach out to her with his mind. He left the decision in her hands, and she hated him for understanding her, for knowing that she must do this alone.  
  
She set her hand upon the brass knob, which was startlingly warm. She could smell the tangy scent of the metal, like blood, and, that scent in her mind, she turned the knob.  
  
Charles Xavier sat behind his desk, his agile fingers moving over a typewriter. Despite his revolutionary work in the fields of science, he had ever preferred to use the anachronistic device instead of a computer. "Ah, Liara," he said, without looking up.  
  
He finished typing, and then turned to regard her. The lines around his eyes deepened as a warm smile appeared on his face and did not falter as he took in her face, which was gaunt behind her black glasses. "I see, Miss Suzuki, that you still have not learned to knock."  
  
Seven years ago she would have blushed at his reprimand. Now she shrugged; she was no longer the type of person who was expected to knock. She stood before him, aware of his appraisal. Now, at last, he extended his mind to hers, skimming through the surface layers, and coming up short against the barriers that she maintained that barred deeper contact. She felt his sadness like a tangible third entity in her mind.  
  
Sighing and withdrawing his psyche, Xavier looked up at her. She briefly sensed weariness in his demeanor, but he blocked before she could be sure. Her ordeal had affected him deeply, she knew; he had been the one who had sat beside her bed as she recovered, who had healed her mind as Jean and Hank had healed her body. He had also been the one who let her go when he understood that there was no more that he could do.  
  
"Professor," she said. She wanted to express the gratitude and warmth she felt for him, but when she spoke, her voice was, as ever, cold.  
  
"Why have you come home, Liara?" He asked, curiosity clear in his voice.  
  
She shivered, home. "I have something to tell you," she said softly.  
  
He was silent, unwilling to prompt her. He had given her all the help that he could, and now she must help herself.  
  
"He," she forced out in a dispassionate tone, "Has someone."  
  
Xavier sat up straighter, more alert. "How do you know?"  
  
"I." she began, and could not finish.  
  
"Sit, Liara," Professor Xavier said kindly.  
  
She did not. Instead she schooled herself, until everything but the ice was gone from her. Then she was ready to tell her story. "For the past two years, I have been.researching his facilities. There is a location in Africa, deep within the Sahara, where I spent a lot of time.researching. While the facility appears to be a satellite beacon outpost, I discovered another operation going on. Unbeknownst to the civilian personnel, there is a portion of the outpost that has nothing to do with interstellar communications, and is instead devoted to certain medical studies." She paused. "Mutant medical studies."  
  
"For the first part of the time that I was there, most of their work was either theoretical or on the molecular level. But recently, they began screening live candidates. And they have one, a little girl, who is perfect for their project." She finished, and though her tone had remained level, she was surprised to find her hands curled into tight fists. She forced them open and folded them behind her back.  
  
He still did not speak, and she felt anger twinge inside her. "Professor. You must help!" she said, her voice remaining level, but containing a fierce urgency.  
  
"Did you try to free her?" he inquired.  
  
She bit her lip and exhaled audibly. "Yes," she said, almost inaudibly. She raised her head so that her eyes, behind her glasses, met his. "I could not do it alone." She hated him briefly for forcing her to admit her inadequacy.  
  
A ghost of a smile returned to Xavier's face. "No one can, you know," he said matter-of-factly.  
  
She glared at him; perhaps everyone else couldn't, but she could.  
  
"Of course I will help you, child," Xavier said, before Liara could contradict him. "We shall have a meeting tonight to discuss the best plan of action. Until then, you may settle in. I believe your old rooms are available."  
  
Liara was not certain if she was glad to hear that or not; she longed to slide seamlessly back into life at the mansion, yet she knew that it was impossible. Sleeping in her old bed would be a way of deluding herself into thinking that she could regress back to her former self. Liara had learned the hardest way that the past was an avenue that was closed; only the present was real. However, she said none of this to the Professor. She just nodded, in thanks, if not in agreement.  
  
As she turned to walk out of Xavier's office, she heard him say, "Welcome back, Liara. Welcome home." 


End file.
